Our friend Jeff Bauer from Forbes.com just sent us this open position:

Web Projects Analyst

Forbes.com plans to continue producing innovative web offerings at an increasing rate, and is creating this new position to identify new site development opportunities, keep projects running smoothly and measure the success of live initiatives. Core responsibilities include:

1) Coordinating projects and status reports across departments

2) Working with analytics tools to generate reports

3) Presenting statistical data and project goals and performance

4) Analyzing site metrics and working…

...continue to read "Web Analyst -looking for a new opportunity?"

It was on Fox.com’s “out there” page yesterday.

A local coin dealer in Dover, Delaware pulled off a publicity stunt that got him some pretty good national attention. He "spent" a penny worth $500 and announced it to the world, or at least to Dover. The world was listening however and he got more publicity than he probably imagined. A great investment of only $500, right?

This could be the end of the story, but I wanted to know more.

...continue to read "Are You Ready for Traffic?"

Last time, I announced the death of the Web page. Echoing a few responses I received, a reader wrote:

So what is taking the place of the now-defunct Web page? If the windmill Eisenberg is tilting at is page view statistics, that battle was won long ago. I haven’t talked to a single company recently that believes that’s still a relevant metric of Web site success.

Though this reader is correct — few argue that page views are a measure of Web…

...continue to read "Bound in Page Views?"

The hard-core truth is that good grammar builds customer confidence in you.  Good grammar is not a love-it-or-leave-it proposition.

So, when you’ve got a copywriting usage question or can’t remember the correct answer to something you dimly recall a teacher talking about in the only grammar class you ever took back in high school, where do you turn? 

You could turn to a style manual.  Ho-hum.  Or you could turn to The Grammar Girl.  She’s dry, she’s funny, she’s sensible, and…

...continue to read "Solving Those Niggling Grammar Questions"

WebTrends is holding their customer summit in beautiful Orlando. They have a marvelous program and entertainment planned for all attendees. Tonight we head to the Blues Brother review and I apologize for not getting the picture of Greg Drew coming on stage in his Blues Brother’s hat and shades.

Greg delivered an insightful keynote and I hope the audience took good notes.  We also had a fabulous birds of a feather luncheon. I was joined at creating the "short yellow…

...continue to read "WebTrends: The Great Attraction in Orlando"

Yet another fine interview with Bryan Eisenberg…

In our Total Picture Radio interview, Bryan Eisenberg, co-founder of Future Now, explains why most online marketing fails to convert traffic to customers, and how companies can use "Persuasion Architecture" to begin achieving success. We discuss how individuals can best use blogs to build their "personal brand" on the Internet. 

Hear the whole interview from totalpicture.com. 

...continue to read "Bryan Eisenberg on Blogs, Brands, and Persuasion Architecture"

We just noticed Amazon is now fulfilling orders for the softcover version of our bestselling Call to Action: Secret Formulas to Improve Online Results (it was due out the end of the month). This isn’t just a reprint of the hardcover, this is more the book we wanted to write when we released Call to Action in May 2005, but had to rush it out early for our friends at WebTrends for their seminar series. We stripped out over 30,000 words…

...continue to read "Call To Action – Take Two"

Personas help you understand why customers do what they do, so you can predict and persuade more effectively.

It was like Groundhog Day. I had the same conversation over and over and over again. I was at the Shop.org Summit in New York. It was a record breaking crowd, over 2200 attendees. I talked to a whole bunch of those online retailers and everyone was saying basically the same thing …

“I want to know what my customers are doing on my…

...continue to read "Would You Rather Know What Customers Do or Why They Do It?"

Your online persuasive process can help fuel offline sales as well.

Let’s pretend for a moment that your analytics reports are lying to you. (It’s nothing personal; they just don’t always see the big picture.)

Now think about a few key questions: Do you know what percentage of online visitors your business converts into offline customers? How many offline sales have you lost from bad online experiences and vice versa? How depressing and/or exciting would it be if you could accurately measure…

...continue to read "Online Planning for Offline Results"

One of our favorite software companies, Techsmith, just launched a fantastic new product called Uservue. Uservue allows you to conduct usability testing via the web, thus removing geographical limitations.

We decided to draft up a basic profile of a typical user and click through the site and see what kind of experience this profile would have. This is a very simplistic execution of what we do when we assemble a "PSA" for one of our clients. 

Watch the video.  (5 min. 29 sec. …

...continue to read "Persuasive Scenario Analysis"